Now that the forums work again, I'll mention that this was also discussed here.

Hmm, quite interesting. I myself never played enough in NH, but it's nice feature. But I don't like much idea about full inventory. IMO it wolud be better to generate just a few items (and no artifacts, no food, maybe no potions, etc.). Also I don't like idea about bones level. Again, IMO generating experienced monster (who killed previous PC), maybe some kind of ghost and some remains like bones would be enough. And definitely not a grave. Just something like :

You found a <not too old> heap of bones and some <valuable> equipment. It must be remains of some unlucky adventurer.
Do you want to disturb his peace? (y/N)
<y>
A <ghost> rises from bones!
Ghost (or some other ethemeral undead) actually is named and experienced according to dead PC, but not his spells/attributes/etc. Hey, imagine a ghost of paladin/priest casting Turn Undead!
Another thing, I don't know what it'll like in JADE, but I dislike idea of bones files. I know it isn't very good from the POW of programmer, but one binary file with all hiscore and bones information seems nice enough. Also this will prevent some kind of "bones scumming". After all, JADE isn't going to become some kind of online multiplayer like NH.

i have seen this feature implemented in the game dungeon crawl. in this game, a ghost character has spells and power similar to the deceased character, although no items are gained from killing it. the ghosts do not leave the level in which they died, and they are worth quite a bit of experience. this feature could be implemented on the simplest level by creating a named Ghost monster, with an experience level equal to the dead PC. the experience value of killing such a ghost should be reward enough. perhaps a ghost could have a chance to drop an item of a specific type, such as bows for archers, spellbooks for wizards, hammers for weaponsmiths, etc. higher level PCs could be generated as Ghost lords or Ghost Kings.

Yes! I am for this Idea. My brother and I have been trying to figure out some way to implement it without severe balance issues. This is what we came up with:
1) The chances of you meeting the ghost must be very low (max. of two or three per game... Maybe a talent that comes after Treasure hunter getting you a higher chance)
2) The dead person would be the same as when they were living (except dead... so weak to fire and turn spells)
3) Must dig to their shrine and defeat their worshipers
i.e.

#####################################################################
......................................##############################################ggg#
..............................@..................................................................... ....................####ggG#
......................................#########################################..####ggg#
############################################################..########

Where, if you were an archer, there would be rock throwers/raiders/ratling archers...etc
The shrines are like royal vaults.

4) the worshippers lvl. is proportional to the dead PC (but a lot lower because the ghost should be the hardest part)

5) once you kill them, you get a custom Artifact, but not necessarily very good (depending on lvl of PC)
i.e. Horaa's bow (+5,+1)
or Jen the Healer's Bracers of regeneration (+1,+1) [+3,+2] +reg. +poison res. +disease res.
or for higher level
i.e. Alesrax the Wizards spellbook Gives 1 casting of all the spells Alesrax had
or much better....
6) none of these artifacts should be as good as a randomly generated one, or something to that effect

7) The only PC's eligible for ghosts are ones on the high score list.

8) if the random artifact generator would be to complex, have a corpse.
i.e. Gruff the Barbarian corpse +1 To. +1 dam to fighting aggressively. This method can have set effects for every class, with each class having five or so options of effects where only two are chosen for an uncursed corpse.

I think i like Fullmoon's idea the best... it really seems to fit within the lore as well. I mean, there are thousands of adventurers setting off into the world - the manual itself says so - so why would each one get a shrine? Even if it was only the really powerful ones... I don't know I just don't like the shrine idea. However, you did give me a good idea though Krough... what if, after Treasure Hunter, there was a Dungeon Raider talent(possible requiring additional talents as prerequisites) that increased the occurrence of vaults in dungeons?

I have an alternative idea. I have never been very close to a win in ADOM yet, but I hate the idea of a game just -ending- when you win. How about a.. sort of "challenge game" was opened up, once you've won? Like a location at the map that was only open after you've gotten a win. In this temple you will enter once, and never come out. Here you will duel opponents that increases in difficulty until you die. How about throwing in NPCs that are shadows of previous winners in here? First of all I think it would be a fun challenge. Second of all, it would mix well with the lore. Previous winners would be natural to find in this location, as they too are there to fight for glory like the PC :)
These fights should be VERY challenging, and give a "bonus" score. (Perhaps a separate score than the game-score)

I think there should be a reward for defeating a Memory (or whatever it would be called), but on the other hand gaining too many valuable items would be unbalanced. Maybe convert artifacts into similiar non-artifact items, such as Staff of the Archmagi -> staff of the magi. Also, the requirement of being more powerful than the Memory helps: Trying to get the inventory from an archmage wish engine will be difficult - unless you're more powerful already, in which case you don't really need the stuff anyway.

Why not? NetHack has graves in bones levels, too. :P

Maybe have a few exceptions such as disabling Turn Undead, but otherwise they should be similiar to the dead PCs IMO. I mean, why disable attributes? Also, some PCs can be low-level but otherwise quite powerful. A lucky 7-level grey elven wizard might have already found herbs and spellbooks of Lightning Bolt and Teleport. Having similiar spells/skills/etc fits very well the "Monsters are players" philosophy, and makes the whole thing much more interesting. *I* would want to be able to fight against one of my former PCs! :D

Not every dead character would be saved in a bones level/shrine, the chance should be small. 1/50 or something like that.

Encountering bones levels in should be even rarer: 1-2 in a single game. IIRC NetHack has a limit of one per game.

Also, PCs dying in a special level (such as the Elemental temples in ADOM or a level that already is a bones level) should prevent the level from being saved, because of possible problems. What if one has already taken an important artifact from a special level to somewhere else and then dies on the special level?